[Times photo: Jamie Francis ]Assistant Public Defender Dee Ann Athan, left, with fellow attorneys Lyann Goudie and Lisa Campbell, holds Valessa Robinson's hand before the lunch recess Monday. Earlier, Athan won the right to refer to her client by her first name or as "this child."

Valessa in 1994, as a member of a Little League softball team

[Special to the Times]

Valessa as a member of the Tampa Northwest "Y" swimming team. Her age at the time is unknown.

[Photo courtesy of Jim Englert]

Valessa, 10, with both arms broken from a fall off a swing. Laura Klug, who is married to Vicki Robinson's cousin, saw the girl here and said: "I can't see what went wrong."

[Photo courtesy of family ]

[Photo courtesy of Jim Englert]Vicki Robinson and Jim Englert, during a visit to her parents' Michigan cabin in July 1997. A divorced father of three, Jim was in love with Vicki.

[Times photo: Jamie Francis]Vicki Robinson planned to send Valessa to Steppin' Stone Farm, a Christian boarding school in rural Hillsborough. "Valessa was no worse than any of the girls who come here," said director Cindy Churchill.